Stricken, Smitten, and Afflicted
by DutchessBoo
Summary: Another Holmes comes to visit, Sherlock phones a friend, and Dr. John Watson is heartily surprised.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimers:** _Characters (excepting Pascal and Jade, who are very much mine) belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the lovely boys at BBC, and the ever-brilliant Moffat and Gatiss. Also, BEWARE of obnoxious OOC's and mild language. Any critiques/corrections/advice is greatly appreciated!_

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><p>Sherlock could not stop thinking. Facts and phrases collected over the past week were bubbling and shivering through his cerebellum, words pouring out of his mouth like water. This was not unusual—Sherlock was constantly thinking, his thought processes arranging themselves in neat, orderly columns—but this chaotic, lyrical hurricane of scenes and noise was frighteningly out of his control.<p>

The part of his brain that was somehow above all this frantic burbling was feeling very sorry for John, sitting across from the detective with his cheek to his palm. The blond man's elbow was propped up on the kitchen table, his back sloped and leaning, his free hand wrapped around a cup of that tea that he always insisted on consuming.

He didn't seem to be following much of Sherlock's dialogue, but it was wearing on him nonetheless. His eyelids drooping, he would take a deep, shuddering breath every couple of seconds, stroking the smooth ceramic of his mug with lazy enervation. The coherent section of Sherlock's brain was strangely drawn to John's hand, examining the tanned skin and the sturdy fingers, the blocky knuckles and the rivulets of veins slithering up his arm, the curve of his elbow and the pale, silky hairs of his forearm.

_Oh no,_ Sherlock's mind whispered to itself, _we cannot succumb completely. I will not allow myself to submerge any further into this pit of confusion. _

Temporarily constrained, the detective forced his eyes up to John's face, only to see the man's lips forming words of his own, his china blue eyes clouded with fatigue. The cranial clutter began to fade from a frenzied roar to a muted thunder, superseded by a familiar voice bellowing his name.

"_Sherlock!_" John shouted for the third time, struggling to sit up straight, "We've been sitting here for over an hour and I can't even _pretend_ to know what you're talking about anymore. Can we please go to bed now?"

Ignoring John's curious use of the word 'we', Sherlock glanced over at the wall clock nestled in the sink. "It's three in the morning, John," he rumbled, feeling his mental faculties beginning to rearrange themselves into an organized flow, "Eight hours of sleep is already too highly esteemed; sacrificing valuable moments of thought for three is practically wasteful."

John sighed, his head dropping dangerously close to his cup of tea. Feeling very much empowered by this flash of normality, Sherlock rose to his feet, John following. "_Sherlock_," he sighed, trying to make amends with his rumpled hair, "You need to go to bed. As your friend, probably your best and perhaps only friend, I am _telling_ you to go to bed. Are we clear?"

The words 'best', 'only', and 'friend' ringing through his head, Sherlock shivered, his mind running at lightning speed. He was not sure he would able to handle John's concern in his present state and made up his mind to escape as quickly as possible.

"Coffee," he finally managed to stutter, "I need coffee."

John, caught in mid-yawn, threw him a confused glance. "Coffee? We don't have any—where are you going to get coffee at _three in the morning_?" he protested, fumbling for his tea. Sherlock, desperation bleeding up from his belly into his chest, ignored him, snatching his coat and scarf from the stack of books they were lying on and almost leaping down the stairs.

His phone was out of his pocket by the time he had hit the landing and he had started a new message on his way out the door. The fresh air, sharp and metallic, did little to subdue his nerves and only slightly more to curb the fire behind his ribs.

**Need your help. Are you in? SH**

He summoned a cab, his heart rate a good fifty points above average. This madness, this jumble of emotions flittering in his stomach was foreign to him; or, perhaps, so forgotten that it seemed new. It would've been an understatement to say that the detective was curious, the thirst for explanations parching his throat like the dryness of the desert, but he was comfortable broaching such subjects as this with only three people. One was dead, another was romancing a baron in Abyssinia, and the last seemed to be refusing to text him back.

Five minutes into the cab ride, however, the phone vibrated in Sherlock's gloved hands, sending a shivering jolt of some unnamed feeling into his jaw. There was a press of the button, the screen lit up white—

**Come on over, coffee's hot. AJ**

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><p>John was woken by a pounding in his head. Or maybe it was the door. He wasn't quite sure. Either way, he was outright refusing to get up.<p>

"John, dear—you up?"

It was Mrs. Hudson, pounding away at the door of their flat. Exhausted and imminently cranky, John was very comfortable where he was—namely, lying in his bed and enjoying the furry-mouthed silence of the early morning—and did not want to leave, much less speak. So instead of answering his landlady like a proper, upstanding English tenant, he rolled over and shoved his tawny head under his pillow.

"_Jo-hn,_" her voice came again, bright and frighteningly sunny, "Sherlock has a visitor, would you mind sending him down?"

John groaned. "He's out for coffee," he mumbled, knowing full well that Mrs. Hudson had no chance of hearing him through the cushion. He didn't much care. If the sun, coming in white-hot and obnoxious through his window, was any indicator of the time, he was still about ninety minutes short of the three hours sleep he was promised and he was in no mind to skimp on slumber today.

As if she had heard his rebellious declaration of obstinacy, there was no further word from Mrs. H. As for Sherlock, John was too tired to be any more than slightly concerned for the detective's wellbeing, but the gnawing of his conscience forced him to at least attempt a quick text. He groped on the nightstand for his phone, knocking over an empty glass, a John Grisham novel, and a saucer of M&M's in the process.

**Visitor to see you, come back soon. JW**

Due diligence completed, John was verging on sleep when a series of echoing bangs on his bedroom door shocked him into lucidity. "John, dear, do you know where Sherlock went, he's not in his bedroom and he hasn't left a note; d'you think he's alright?"

_Virgin Mary mother of God_, Mrs. Hudson was knocking on his door—his _bedroom door_—and John was in nothing but his skivvies. Buried under piles of comforter, yes, but still practically naked. Unadulterated panic propelled him across the room to his dresser, hands flying amongst a storm of neutral-tone jumpers and slightly-worn jeans— "_Hold on a minute_!"

"If you could hurry up, love, I really hate to keep this young man waiting—"

John thought himself very prepared to shoot Mrs. Hudson if she came through his door a second too soon, tossing a olive green V-neck over his head while struggling into a pair of dark denims. He was also in the mind to shoot Sherlock, if he ever got back, for neglecting to inform him of this unannounced caller. The doctor was used to surprises by now, having been kidnapped by a group of Chinese smugglers and a murderous maniac in the space of a month, but he had _not_ been in only his underwear at the time.

Running a hand through his wildly rumpled hair, John tossed the spare clothing into the closet, threw his bed into some semblance of order and was finally ready to open the door when a saccharine-looking Mrs. Hudson opened it for him. "Lovely to see you up and dressed, love!" she clipped.

_You better thank your lucky stars I'm up and dressed,_ John thought crossly, _'cause if I hadn't been, I would've kicked you down the damn stairs. _Heaven forbid he say this aloud, however; he was both relieved and a bit miffed to hear "Oh, yes—quite lovely," come docilely out of his mouth. Mrs. Hudson smiled. "Good. Now let me introduce you to Pascal—come on over, love, and meet Dr. Watson—he's Sherlock's cousin."

"Nephew," said this mysterious Pascal from the stairs, and John's brow wrinkled in confusion. "I didn't know Mycroft had any children."

Mrs. Hudson shook her head at him knowingly. "Not Mycroft, dear, Cuthbert. Right between him and Sherlock, the poor boy. Lives in Oxford, I believe—isn't that right, Pascal?"

Pascal appeared from around the stairwell, looking not at all put off by Mrs. Hudson's elaborations, and nodded. "Yeah; and hullo," he grinned, addressing the last part of the sentence towards John. Feeling very much the idiot, the blond man stood in open-mouthed astonishment and stared, wondering if Mrs. Hudson had been lured into a particularly clever prank, or perhaps, a precarious trap (thought the sliver of John that was still strapped to a semtex vest), since there was almost no way this boy was a Holmes.

He was too short, for starters. Sherlock and Mycroft towered over John, while this Pascal fellow was about John's height, if a little taller. His coloring was another anomaly—he was much fairer than either of the Holmes brothers John knew with a head of thick, bone-straight hair that, to the extent of John's knowledge, was naturally a brilliant white blond. He was also possessed of a healthier complexion; his skin freckled and lightly tanned.

Among the copious contradictions John could pinpoint in Pascal's appearance, it was his eyes that persuaded him that this boy might just be Pascal Holmes and not Pascal Smith, or Pascal Brown, or Pascal Moriarty, (_oh lord, there he went again_). They were almost identical to Sherlock's—a liquid, opalescent blue-gray tinged with a honey jade; smooth and serene, so lucid it was uncomfortable, yet so impenetrable it was unsettling. Those eyes defied all incongruities in this mysterious visitor, including his up-to-the-minute, casual clothing, sharp, silvery piercings, and bold, upward-sweeping hairdo, prompting John to step out of his bedroom, smile pleasantly and offer both the new Holmes and his landlady a cup of tea.

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><p><em>I can run faster than this<em>, Sherlock thought erroneously, frustration nipping at the stem of his brain with annoying persistence. He was tired, and he did not want to admit it, but impatience and ill-thought, plebian comments were giving him away.

The hotel was only a twenty minute drive; he reminded himself, a leather-clad thumb rubbing broad strokes across the screen of his phone; it would not kill him to endure twenty minutes in a cab. With the night at the pool still shuddering in the back of his mind, however, he wasn't quite sure what he could handle anymore.

It was none too soon that the pale, ornamented face of the Queen's Hotel loomed up out of the darkness. Sherlock paid the cabbie in silence, shoving his phone is his pocket and tightening his scarf. Anxiety was beginning to fester in the pit of his stomach, and he needed to remedy that as soon as possible.

"Floor thirteen, room seven-twelve, please," he informed the lady at the front desk, a slim, dark-skinned woman with short, tightly-curled hair. She looked up at him, curiosity glimmering in her dark eyes. "And what name should I give, sir?"

Sherlock threw her a cursory glance—_African descent but never been, single but only recently, compulsive exerciser_—and spoke in a rich baritone. "Sherlock Holmes."

The lady nodded, picking up the phone and tapping out a quick succession of numbers. "Sherlock Holmes for room seven-one-two, please," she intoned, hesitating for a moment before cupping the speaker and turning to Sherlock, "You can go ahead and go up, sir. Ms. Simmons will meet you in the hallway."

He took the lobby in leaps and bounds and would've thrown the elevator door open if he could. The closeness of answers, unpretentious friendship, and hot coffee was exacerbating the ache in his chest and he was drumming an anxious pattern with his left foot all the way up to floor thirteen.

There was a quiet ding, and the elevator shuddered to a stop. Sherlock burst through the doors before they were completely open and his heart fell. _Of course,_ he thought, _Jade is Jade, and a very significant person. You don't become the head executive of a syndicate by doing everything yourself; obviously she is not going to meet me in the hallway._

"Morning, Sherlock," said Hollister, a tall brawny blond man with a ten-gallon Stetson perched on top of his celadon curls. Sherlock nodded curtly in reply, the urgency beginning to resurge in his throat. Silently, he followed the blond down the hallway, passing several glossy black doors before reaching one emblazoned with 712. "E. Hollister and guest," he spoke into the peephole, placing on large-palmed hand on the slick wood below the numbers. Sherlock could hear the buzzing of machinery, a soft click, and then an oddly musical beep.

Hollister gestured towards the doorknob. "Go on in," he encouraged, stepping out of the darker man's way. Sherlock gave another swift nod, and opened the door.

"I'm in the kitchen," a voice—honeyed and velvet, and most definitely American—floated from the room to the left. The door led into the living room; a wide area with a wall of window, set with a sable leather sofa and chairs, and bright steel furnishings. Sherlock trod carefully, almost reverently, over the slick hardwood, heading towards the sound of the voice.

Last-minute hesitation was catching in his throat. Perhaps Jade did not have time to talk to him, perhaps she had changed her mind—

_No,_ Sherlock told himself, _do not back down. You need this. Go get it._

He slipped through the archway with bated breath, his fingers clutched around his phone—

"Ey, Sherlock," Jade murmured, standing over the stove and stirring something chocolaty in a large silver pot. She was wearing her pyjamas—a pair of shorts and a loose t-shirt—which surprised Sherlock. He had expected to see her dressed as per usual, in slick black heels and a short black dress, her hair a long river of ebony down her back.

"You never told me your hair was curly," he breathed, leaning against the doorjamb. Jade laughed, deep and throaty. "I thought you would've guessed by now," she admitted, setting her spoon down on a napkin and padding over to where Sherlock stood, "Good to see you."

She enveloped him a warm, relaxed embrace, the pervasive smell of vanilla and caramel and chocolate ganache flooding his senses. It got him every time, to borrow the colloquialism—he was not used to hugs from anyone, much less Mafiosas who stomped around in five-inch heels, toting ak-47s with ease. "Erm, hullo again," he murmured.

"Hey," Jade grinned, releasing him and returning to her cooking, "Coffee's in the pot. Oh, and turn on the lights while you're there, will you?"

Sherlock knew the location of the switch without even having to think about it. Light flooded the kitchen, illuminating the silver countertops, ebony cupboards, and sleek island covered with pots and pans. Jade was no longer veiled in shadow, her form clearly highlighted. She had not changed, with the exception of her hair, and the loose curls pinned at the back of her head suited her.

"So, you text me at three in the morning, and twenty minutes later, you're here," she murmured, scooping a ladleful of whatever it was in the pot and pouring it into a rasberry pink mug, "How'd you know I was in town?"

Sherlock walked over to the island and slid onto it, unbuttoning his coat and loosening his scarf. "To be completely honest," he clarified, "I didn't."

Jade looked lazily surprised, placing her hands on wided hips. "Oh really? This is really a desperate, faith-based _appel a l'aide_. I see."

She grinned at him, interest shimmering in her honey-gold eyes. Switching the stove-top off, she grasped her mug and made to join Sherlock on the island counter. "Continue," she urged.

Sherlock took a deep, rough breath—

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><p>"This tea is really fantastic," Pascal was saying, slumped in Sherlock's chair. His hands were wrapped around a fragrant mug of Lapsang Suchong, and John was quite pleased that he was not the only one who liked its unusual smoky, barbequed flavor. "Thanks. Have all you want."<p>

Pascal smiled, his eyes glowing cerulean. John was beginning to see all sorts of similarities in the younger Holmes and his flatmate, more physical than personality-wise. The way the boy moved—quick and sharp, yet fluid—was a vibrant imitation of his uncle, and the sprawling attitude he had assumed in Sherlock's chair was a perfect mimicry of the man's careless posture.

"So, um," John began, deciding to take advantage of Pascal's emergent good nature and probe for some answers, "I would ask if Mycroft sent you, but since you're not his son—"

Pascal laughed, bright and energetic. "Well, actually, he kind of did. Talked to my dad and finagled him into sending me down for a visit. That whole bit about learning what real life is like, or something equally parental. Probably thought seeing an honest-to-goodness flat share would turn me off moving out any sooner than twenty-two."

Amused by the combination of normal 'teenager-speak' and Holmesian verbosity, John grinned. "Yeah. Yeah, I—oh lord," he yelped and then flushed, fishing in his back pocket for his cell phone. Pascal raised a unusually dark brow as John slid the phone open and checked his messages.

**On my way, bringing a friend. SH**

"Is that Sherlock?" Pascal inquired, sipping at his tea. John, rather miffed at the prospect of _another_ visitor, nodded in ascent. "Yeah. He's on his way back and I guess he's bringing a friend," he informed, shoving the phone back in his pocket; lack of sleep and too many surprises were grating on his nerves and Sherlock's unpredictability was not helping, "He leaves for coffee at three in the morning and is just now coming back, the wanker."

Pascal laughed again, banishing John's belated compunction at insulting the boy's uncle. "He's always been like that;" he revealed, his eyes clouded with a fond recollection that John rarely saw in Sherlock's eyes, "I remember one day he showed up in the middle of my biology class with a couple of train tickets and whisked me away to see an autopsy in Scotland. Mum wasn't very happy, obviously, but I thought it was pretty cool."

"So, I'm assuming Sherlock's the favorite uncle, then," John joked, feeling very chummy and a bit self-satisfied gleaning Sherlock stories from the younger Holmes. It was like he had one-upped the detective by discovering this peephole into his family life. Pascal grinned. "Yeah. I mean, Mycroft's alright, but he can be a bit of a prick sometimes. Of course, so can Sherlock, but he's a fun prick and Myc's just a snob. And don't even get me started on Great-Aunt Hypanthia—"

John frowned. "Hypanthia?" he questioned, and Pascal nodded. "Gran's half-sister. A complete psycho, that one, crazier than Sherlock by spades."

Trying to imagine someone crazier than Sherlock I'm-so-smart-it's-ridiculous Holmes would fry his brain, John was sure, but he did leave himself a mental note to watch out for this Hypanthia Holmes at the Christmas dinners Sherlock had threatened to subject him to. "I guess craziness runs in the family, then," John snorted, "no offense, or anything."

Pascal smiled, his eternal agreeableness pleasing John to no end. "None taken," he drawled, "you learn to live with it, and Dad and Mum aren't so bad. I think once you settle down, it gets better. If Mycroft would just find himself a girlfriend and get on with it, he'd be a lot nicer, I think."

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><p><em>To be continued, If it strikes my fancy. Or, perhaps, if the plot fairy comes to visit. <em>


	2. Chapter 2

_Part 2! Much thanks to my lovely reviewers Bec and WAT2DO-y'all are the best!_

**_Disclamer: _**_See first chapter  
>BEWARE OF: obnoxious OOC's and mild language. Any critiquesreviews/corrections/etc are greatly appreciated!_

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><p>"I've grown unreasonably attached to my flatmate," Sherlock said in one whoosh of breath, the words leaving his head to hang black and solid in the air.<p>

"And this is a problem how?" Jade's voice, smooth and low, slid into the air like syrup, disintegrating the letters of Sherlock's statement into dark, dusty particles. Sherlock closed his eyes to relieve some of the pressure of his thoughts, words pressing and tugging at his lips in an agitated rush to get out. _It's wrong because I'm a high-functioning sociopath and I'm dangerous and I don't care about people and it's wrong because no one should have to go through what John went through but now I can't let him leave and it's wrong because I'm Sherlock Bloody Holmes and I don't need _**anyone**.

He didn't say any of this, and yet Jade could read it in his eyes and the curve of his lips.

"I heard about the pool," she murmured, "very interesting man, Moriarty. Took a huge risk hosting hostage situation in a public pool; although that's pretty damn tame when you consider he pulled the same stunt in the middle of an intersection."

She glanced at Sherlock from the corner of her eye, petite nose and high, rounded cheekbones highlighted by the fluorescents glowing above them. Sherlock remained silent, his face peaked and pale over whorls of navy-blue pashmina.

"I talked to Mycroft," she prompted, searching Sherlock's eyes for any rogue emotion, "told me everything. He's worried about you, the idiot. Said this was pushing you over the edge."

No response. Sherlock's features were set and unmoving, completely void of expression. He looked ethereal, almost angelic sitting knees-to-chin on the cluttered table-top, his jaw an exquisite line curving up to cheekbones of sliced ivory.

Jade sat unobtrusive and soundless, her legs crossed as Buddha, her face clouded, lacking the inner peace so valued by the _Śākyamuni_. Sherlock knew she would speak first, knew that she would draw him out and he would only have to follow.

"Who shot him," she whispered. She didn't specify, but Sherlock knew she meant John. Noble, noble John, shot mid-tackle; a bullet meant for Sherlock embedded in his ribs.

"I don't know."

She nodded, letting a knowing 'hmmm' slip through her lips. Sherlock bit down on the inside of his lip, breathing in through his nose. He did not appreciate the way Jade read humanity like one would read a magazine at the dentist: saw through their eyes into their head and deciphered the jumbled scribbling of their thoughts.

He himself could easily predict people, since most of them were the same and therefore lent themselves and their actions to being anticipated, but he couldn't _understand_ them, couldn't make sense of the passions that fueled their movements. It was Jade, solid, steadfast Jade, who had somehow discovered this window of empathy through which she could lay bare any soul and then wrap it back up again. Sherlock had found it in him to be rather jealous of this talent, even more so now that she had the impudence to use it on him.

"It's not your fault, you know, she murmured, placating the detective with warm bronze eyes, "he wasn't shot because of you."

Sherlock smiled, but only with his mouth, his eyes impassive. '_It's not your fault'—_textbook response, really. He was unmoved.

"It was my bullet," he said flatly, "John shouldn't have taken it."

Jade chuckled into her cup, dry and cynical. "I'd like to see you tell him that," she dared, and fevered elation flared up in Sherlock's chest. This mouthy reply was what he expected—no, hoped for—not some prearranged slop about not feeling guilty and life being out of his control.

She must've forgotten how to handle him, Sherlock realized—that explained her attempt at shallow, pedestrian advice. She had to readjust, had to remember how to function around her intellectual superior.

"Stop analyzing me, Sherlock."

Jade had flicked him hard in the arm, the fire of fractious thought reflected in her eyes. He turned to her, surprised evident in the trinity of lines between his brows.

"You hit me," he said, more impressed than offended, "why did you hit me?"

Jade rolled her eyes, throwing Sherlock a bored, almost condescending look typical of Mycroft. "You are not allowed to rescind into that transcendent area of your brain when we're talking about personal issues and-or emotions, capiche?"

Her eyes were narrowed and crackling yellow, her lips pursed, but Sherlock was far from intimidated. She had veered into the arena of snarky cerebral banter—whether purposely or by accident—and now he had the higher ground.

"You used the word 'rescind' correctly—I'm impressed—but 'capisce' is not spelled like you think it's spelled," he rendered loftily, regaining control of his poise for the second time that night. He glanced over at Jade, expecting another affected wobbling of the eyes.

What he got, however, was a look of pity, calm and fathomless in its sincerity and depth, so whole-hearted and enveloping it lit the eyes and dimmed the face to leave a retinal glow that ate up pieces of you from the inside.

He had gotten that look from John recently, after he had fallen in asleep on a tray of radioactive beetles. It had frightened him, if that was the right word, the expression exhausting his flatmate's warm, tawny face and hollowing out his sky-blue eyes.

"Stop looking at me like that," he commanded, trying to cool the flush from marring his neck. Jade refused to look away, her eyes mirrored pools of liquid gold and molten shadow. Sherlock could feel them burning into his brain and crinkling the lines of his thought into disorderly squiggles and swirls. This look, this naked expression of pity, was going to rip him raw and leave him bruised and bleeding—

"Sherlock," Jade breathed, speaking his name in sharp, serrated American tones, making it a prism of razor-edged light, "what's wrong?"

She already knew the answer, had known since he had arrived, but she was going to tear it from his throat because that's who she was—a taker, a forcer.

John was not like that, Sherlock realized in a part of his brain that had once again risen above the cacophony of the rest. No, John was different. He was a giver, a persuader, a helper, a protector—so very, _very_ valuable—

"I break people," Sherlock said, flat and detached. The memory of John's face, how he smelled—like tea leaves and musk and wool jumpers and earthy warmth—had distracted him enough so that the words slipped out.

"Didn't break me."

The contradiction shimmered, light yet firm, unbending, in the air. Jade looked somehow relieved by Sherlock's confession, but her face darkened again when Sherlock laughed hollowly.

"You don't break. Trust me, I've tried."

Jade snorted. "Thanks for that," she sniffed, "but I understand. That's how you make friends—don't give me that look, you know it's true."

Of course he knew it was true, and he couldn't help but sneer at the notion that he, Sherlock Bloody Holmes of 221B-is-for-Bloody-Baker St., did not know every strange, sordid, neatly catalogued facet of himself.

What he did not expect, or particularly like, was Jade's intimate knowledge of this precious, soiled piece of self that he kept so carefully hidden. She began to speak as if she was reading off a tablet in Sherlock's head, and he tensed.

"You don't really like people, I know; you think they're fickle, predictable, and finite in so many ways, which is mostly true. But the people that catch you're interest— you can't tell if they're breakable right up front because they're not ordinary, they're special. They throw you for a loop.

"You like that, obviously, but you still have to test them. Even if they intrigue you, you can't be running around with people who are, fundamentally, the same as all those other idiots you can't stand. So you run them through the cycle and see if they crack."

There was a pause, in which Jade glanced over to Sherlock, swishing the remnants of her chocolate around in her cup. Seared by the accuracy of her exposé, he did not return her gaze, his fingers steepled in front his face.

"You have very good taste in people, Sherlock," Jade assured softly, some of the dewy-eyed pity tainting her eyes, "almost everybody came out fine—"

"Victor," Sherlock spoke before Jade could, his eyes stormy, "I broke Victor."

Memories came slick with the name, more smells than pictures: the whiff of a cigar, the pungent smack of hair gel, the muskiness of stiff leather. Victor Trevor—a boy out of another age. Sherlock had worshipped the ground he stood on until the older boy had cracked under the intensity of the love—if love was what the burning, agonizing emotion really was.

"I don't want that to happen to John."

The words left Sherlock's lips as breaths, light and fragile. Jade closed her eyes, restraining the sigh in her throat so as not to overwhelm the ghosted whispers with the thick, humid air of her lungs.

"You are a very strange man, Sherlock," she spoke carefully, each word measured and light-footed, "if you think that not loving John—"

"I don't love John," was Sherlock's quick reply, those wild ocean eyes darting over to Jade with something like disappointment glimmering in the pale irises. She knew better, she should've known better

"Loving someone and being in love with someone are two very different things, Sherlock; pay attention _s'il vous plait_," Jade argued, veiled frustration simmering in her voice.

She paused a minute, Sherlock mentally thrashing himself for making such an imbecilic remark, and then continued. "As I was saying: you think not loving John will somehow protect him from whatever unpleasantness follows you around. But what you don't get—"

Another pause, this one filled with incredulous laughter from Jade. "What you don't get, is that the very act of not loving John for that specific reason, is you loving John."

Sherlock felt confusion beginning to engulf him again. How could you love someone and yet _not_ love them at the same time? It was impossible, he decided; there was no avenue his consciousness could take that reconciled the two.

Once again, Jade read his thoughts. "Love is a funny thing, Sherlock. It's mistakenly interpreted, often mimicked, and probably the most painful and powerful emotion human beings can feel. But it's worth it—oh lord, Sherlock, it's so worth it."

Sherlock felt himself beginning to crumble. Mazes of cause-and-effect were spreading like a virus through his brain, always coming back into themselves and collapsing into pandemonium—

"Just try it, love," Jade whispered, "just open up a little. It'll kill you if you don't."

There was a very hot pain in Sherlock's chest. Jade's hand, small and brown, was hovering over his palled, long-fingered one, the skin of her palm barely brushing the fine hairs on his knuckles.

He swallowed, shaking himself free from the turmoil of thought. This was something very complicated: a puzzle of sorts that he would have to examine and dissect at a later date. This whole 'loving John' lark was something that would require cautious examination executed over a period of time and aided by a keen brain and a semi-thawed heart. Experimentation would begin presently; for the moment, he would content himself with a cup of very strong black coffee.

"I'd like my coffee now," he said crisply, after taking a thorough breath. Jade looked at him, her concerned eyes mellowed to a mature gold. He raised his brows, broadcasting a message through his gaze. _I'm alright. I'll be alright._

"Good," Jade breathed, and then laughed, her whole countenance relaxing. Sherlock was treated to a lightly hummed rendition of 'La Habanera' as she waltzed around the kitchen, throwing on switches willy-nilly and flooding the room with rich, glorious light.

The air was much more awake, Sherlock noticed as the coffee pot began to bubble. He checked his phone, feeling nearly shattered and yet cleansed. There was a text from John (**Visitor to see you, come back soon. JW**), one from Mycroft (**Check your voicemail, you prat. MH**), and several from Lestrade, all requesting Sherlock's attention as soon as humanly possible, please and thank you. He grinned, his brain whirring.

"Jade," he called, pulling on his gloves; "I need you to do something for me."

* * *

><p>"So, Mycroft's single then?" John asked, vainly attempting to hold back a snicker. Pascal gave a wide-mouthed laugh, revealing straight, porcelain-white teeth decorated with the slim silver line of a retainer.<p>

"Oh yeah. I mean, come on—can you imagine him on an actual date with roses and chocolate and such? He'd do it too well, if you know what I mean; everything would be too perfect."

John nodded, remembering his first date with Sarah. It'd been a far cry from perfection, and that was putting it in a good light, but they were still on for this Thursday—hope springs eternal, he supposed.

"Sherlock still play this?"

Pascal had risen from his chair during John's moment of recollection and was now holding Sherlock's violin. It lay swaddled in its case, a glistening, full-bodied figure of oiled mahogany.

An image rose unbidden to John's mind of Sherlock, clasping the violin to his neck, drawing the bow across the strings as one would slide a knife through butter. He had looked like he was in a trance; eyes closed, mouth parted slightly; and John had tiptoed around the flat on cats' feet, caught between wariness and rapture.

"Oh yeah," he replied, the shrill, nimble strains of Violin Concerto #2 echoing in his ears, "played it last night, in fact."

Pascal hummed knowingly, sliding a long finger over the dark, glossy wood. "He tried to teach me once—I hated it. Took up piano instead, been playing for fifteen years. I'm eighteen, by the way," he added. John raised his eyebrows

"Oh. Oh wow," he said, trying not to sound as surprised as he was. Pascal looked much older, in his twenties, perhaps, and if the knowing expression on the boy's face was any indicator of his thoughts, John was not the only one who had tacked a few extra years onto the younger Holmes age.

"We Holmes's have always looked older than we are," Pascal revealed, "except for Sherlock, who is apparently immortal. I swear, he's going to look the exact same fifty years from now, damn him."

This elicited a giggle from John, who had imagined an eighty-year-old Sherlock looking something like Dick Van Dyke. "Oh, yeah. I mean, the man's four years younger than I am, but he makes it look like a decade."

Pascal set the violin down and returned to his chair, taking a long sip of his tea. After he had finished, he fixed John with a decidedly intrusive stare that was so Sherlockian it sent a shiver up the doctor's spine.

"So," he began, "how exactly did Sherlock rope you into this? You don't seem to be the type to take up with feckless consulting detectives on a lark."

John grinned, shaking his head. He admired Pascal's audacity in asking such a straightforward question, especially one his Uncle Mycroft had rather beat around the bush about, but he was getting rather tired of correcting people's assumptions.

"You know what I think is funny?" he chuckled, "That everyone seems to think Sherlock roped me into this, that he played some little mind games to get me to rent a flat with him and run about after criminals."

He looked up at Pascal, clear blue eyes meeting stormy gray-green ones. "Truth is, he didn't force me into any of this. I chose it. I'd been living a dead man's life before I met Sherlock—same routine day after day with the occasional round of Russian Roulette on the side. It was pointless. Pathetic.

"And then Sherlock came out of nowhere, like some crazy, mad genius, and offered me a life again, a purpose, if you will. I don't see how you could say he forced me into it when only a fool would've turned him down."

He took a deep breath, a little unsettled by the grin on Pascal's face. The boy was opening his mouth to say something when there was a bellow from downstairs.

"John! JOHN!"

It was Sherlock, clomping up the stairs with absolutely no regard for the decorum six o clock in the morning highly deserved. John sighed, rising from his chair and heading for the door of the flat. "Coming, Sherlock."

The door flew open to expose a flushed, exuberant Sherlock and someone completely unexpected—a brown-skinned, curvy sort of woman with a head of long, tousled curls and yellow eyes, wearing jeans and a t-shirt that read YMCMB in large black letters.

"John," Sherlock stormed into the flat, his coat billowing out behind him like a cape, "get your shoes on, we're heading out. I've called Lestrade; he'll meet us at the crime scene. Oh, and this is Jade. Don't make her angry, she'll shoot you and she's almost as good of a shot as you are…"

John sighed, rubbing the heel of his palm against his forehead. "Um, Sherlock, you have a visitor—"

"Of course I have a visitor, John, I brought her with me. Good lord," the detective was in a tizzy, whirling around the room like some sort of Turkish dervish, his eyes alight and settling on Pascal.

"Oh," he said, looking rather displeased with the short blond boy sitting in his chair, "This is what you were talking about. Who sent him here?"

He addressed this to John, who sighed, wishing he was back in bed sipping his tea and reading the papers. "Your brother."

"Which one?" Sherlock demanded, glaring at his flatmate as if this debacle was his fault. The girl, Jade, was snickering under her breath, the weak sunlight highlighting the diamond stud in her nose.

"Mycroft, Sherlock," she spoke, low in tone and definitely American in accent, "Cuthbert never sends you anything."

"No, no he doesn't," Sherlock agreed, making an abrupt about-face and plowing through a stack of misplaced bed linens to arrive at the door again, "He's coming with us, I assume?"

Pascal rose to his feet, grinning. "Of course I am," he answered, setting his tea down on the side table where it joined a host of other empty glasses and mugs.

Sherlock smiled appreciatively. "Good. JOHN! I do not have all day."

"I'm right here, Sherlock," John mumbled, wondering why on earth he was allowing himself to be dragged out of the house for a case this early in the morning, "you don't have to yell."

"But that wouldn't be any fun," Jade whispered, seeming very much at ease with the situation. Of course, if she had earned the rare title of 'friend' from the notoriously friendless Sherlock Holmes, John assumed she was used to this sort of fiasco. John grinned in reply.

"Alright then," Sherlock declared, giving the flat one more once over before tightening his scarf and beginning down the stairs, "A cousin, an American, and the long-suffering John Watson—Lestrade should be very pleased."

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><p><em>Well then. Perhaps we'll end here, perhaps not. Watch and see. <em>


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